The present invention relates to electronic office equipment and, more particularly, to a family of simple, inexpensive, and portable electonic devices for business support including: a simple 2-dimensional digitizing device, a simple transmit-only facsimile transmission device, a facsimile transmission system capable of transmitting and receiving simultaneously with a verbal conversation on a telephone line, a simple transmit-only facsimile transmission system, a simple computer-based facsimile system, a dual-mode page reading device for outputting in a digitizing mode or outputting in a text mode for use by alphanumeric-oriented functions, and a portable office.
Electronic equipment for the support of business functions has provided the capability to do many tasks quickly and easily that previously were either impossible or, at best, tedious and prone to mistakes. Unfortunately, most such equipment is very expensive and/or not easily portable. As a consequence, there is a large segment of the business community that has to do without the benefits of such equipment. Small businesses and sole proprietorships are good examples, as are the rapidly rising number of home offices. Such entities have difficulty affording a full gamut of equipment such as personal computer(s), bi-directional FAX , and photocopy equipment. Typically, the most needed is purchased or leased while the remainder is done without. Mailorder purchases, which represent a rapidly growing portion of the business world, often are delayed while a signed request for the order moves through the mails. Outside salespersons, and the like, (which account for a large percentage of total sales) are another "forgotten" portion of the business community when it comes to electronic assistance. While portable and so-called "laptop" computers are now available at reasonable prices, they provide few, if any, useful services for such sales-oriented individuals. The typical salesperson still spends a good portion of each day searching for a working payphone (in all kinds of weather) and standing in a phonebooth with the handset cradled in the crook of his/her neck while sales information as recorded in a notebook or on sales order blanks is verbally relayed to someone back at the main office --often with mistakes on one or both ends. This, of course, leads to mis-shipped merchandise, lowered profits, unhappy customers, etc. Cellular telephones can help relative to some of the foregoing problem; but they are (1) too crowded for use by all such individuals (i.e. greatly increased usage would lead to cellular gridlock), (2) too noisy for the transmission of legible copies by FAX, and (3) too expensive for the average individual.
A typical example of part of the problem is depicted in FIGS. 1 and 2. The standard FAX machine 10 is a bidirectional device which plugs into the telephone line 12. It is unwieldy, requires a lot of power, and is expensive. It does, however, send and receive very high quality copy. To send a facsimile copy of a sheet of paper 14, the sheet of paper is placed in the input hopper 16 of the sending FAX machine 10 and the telephone number of the receiving FAX machine 10 is dialed on the pushbutton pad 18. When the receiving FAX machine 10 answers, the two machines 10 communicate between one another and establish a connection. The sheet of paper 14 is then automatically fed past the read head 20 and the digitized information therefrom sent over the telephone line 12 to the receiving machine 10 where it is used to cause the print head 22 therein to print a facsimile copy thereof on special paper 24 which is fed past the print head 22. A typical, good quality, bi-directional FAX machine 10 costs in the thousands of dollars in today's market and, while it can be carried, it is definitely not what one would consider "easily portable" such that a salesperson would want to carry it to send sales information back to the main office. Furthermore, while the original so-called "Group I" FAX machines employed an acoustic modem for connection to the telephone line (and, therefore, could have been used with a public phone, or the like), most of today's Group II and Group III machines have dispensed with the modem and must have access to a miniature telephone socket into which they can be plugged directly.
One of the major problems of such contemporary equipment (including FAX, photocopy, etc.) is that it provides better quality than is required for many of the uses mentioned above. The typical salesman does not need to receive FAX copies, only transmit them. Such sales inputs, as well as telephone ordering by the home consumer, requires only the transmission of legible copy to determine account numbers, article identification descriptions/numbers, quantity, and, in the case of remotely input purchase vouchers, a validating signature of the ordering party. For the small business, sole practitioner, home office, and the like, copying of documents for file copies does not have to be high quality--merely readable. What in computer circles is referred to as the "jaggies"0 (i.e. lines and characters composed of discrete line segments instead of smooth curves) can be quite acceptable in many circumstances, particularly where it makes the difference between affordability and doing without.
Wherefore, it is the object of the present invention to provide electronic support capability with respect to the digitizing and transmission of pictorial/alphanumeric data which is inexpensive, easily stored, and truly portable.
It is a further object of the present invention to provide a family of minimum capability electronic equipment for business/engineering applications which is particularly useful to small businesses, sole proprietorships, outside salespersons, home offices, and the like.
It is another object of the present invention to provide a basic transmit-only digitizer which can be used as the basic element in a family of minimum capability electronic equipment for business/engineering/home applications, and the like.
Other objects and benefits of the present invention will become apparent from the description which follows hereinafter when taken in conjunction with the drawing figures which accompany it.